Through studying the lessons of the past, Radical Tradition
works for the creation of social and political structures which allow all
people equal decision making power and equal access to society's wealth.

1 May 2004 - My Union Right or Wrong. A History of the Ship Painters and Dockers Union 1900 to 1932. By Issy Wyner.
This history brings alive the spirit of radical democracy and mateship in the trade union movement in the first decades of the twentieth century. A valuable resource to present and future historians of the labour movement and radicalism in Australia.

15 May 2003 - May Days in Brisbane - Official and unofficial May Day marches. While the ferals and anarchists reclaimed the streets on May 1st, the union movement marched in large numbers on the Labour Day Public Holiday the following monday. The Reclaim the Streets on May 1st was one of a number of events associated with Anarchy for Life..... Brisbane Anarchist & Autonomist Conference.

Make MABO DAY - 3 June - an Australian Public Holiday

Take a holiday on June 3rd to celebrate a great Australian, Eddie Mabo, who overturned the two century fiction of Terra Nullius in a ten year campaign through the courts ending in the historic High Court Mabo Judgement.

June the 3rd marks the anniversary of Mabo Day, a day that has important ramifications for Australian Society. Mabo Day is a day that is virtually unknown and ignored by most Australians.

On the third of June 1992 the High Court of Australia rejected the ridiculous notion of "Terra Nullius", that this land was not occupied before European colonisation. Eddie Mabo a Torres Strait man born on Mer in the Torres Strait and living in Townsville in Queensland conducted a ten year battle through the courts that led to this historic judgement. The Mabo Judgement states in law that indigenous Australians have by prior occupation, ownership of land where native title has not been extinguished.

Last year on the tenth anniversary, Eddie Mabo's widow, Bonita Mabo, called for a national public holiday on the anniversary of the High Court's decision. Mrs Mabo said Eddie Mabo would be singing and dancing in delight over the progress made. "He would be dancing and singing - I can see him doing it," she said. "It's going to be a long time but at least we're starting to get somewhere which is great. Since '92 there was nothing like this around and you know people couldn't say, 'oh this is my land, this is my country, I'm a traditional owner', which makes them so proud of who they are." Mrs Mabo said a national holiday would be the most appropriate way of celebrating Mr Mabo's efforts. "You know we don't have to have the Queen's birthday weekend."

Show respect. Take a holiday on June 3rd to celebrate a great Australian. Why not organise a picnic of your family, your friends, your relatives, your colleagues. Take the day off work and celebrate the achievements of Eddie Koiki Mabo in overturning 'Terra Nullius'. There is still a long way to travel with regards to Native Title, but Eddie showed that individuals can successfully change the course of history.

Image: Photo of Eddie Mabo, superimposed
on the Torres Strait Islander flag
(in use since 29 May 1992)

Mutualism & Benefit Societies
In Recovering Our Roots: Mutualism, Mutuals and the ALP Dr Race Mathews argues for the Australian Labor Party to look to its roots and adopt policies friendly to Mutualism. With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the discrediting of State Socialism, this is part of a reappraisal of socialist and social democratic vision taking into account libertarian currents such as Mutualism overshadowed by Marxism/ Leninism. In Mutuality
Dr Bob James gives a a brief history lesson on the origin of Friendly Societies and Trade Unions, and presents a critique of the demutualisation debate. See also:

Secret Handshakes and Health Care in Australia, by Bob James, provides us with the story of the spread of health care throughout Australia through the efforts of ordinary working people. The story of Friendly Societies, in this case the Grand United Order of Oddfellows, is a remarkable story of mutual aid which for too long has been ignored by labour historians.

Famous quotes:Malcolm Fraser on history:
"One of the hardest things for non-indigenous Australians to understand, especially the older generation, is that the history - if we were taught any history about early settlement days in the early centuries in this country - was not particularly accurate. The history we were taught, that we were led to believe, is not what happened."
Malcolm Fraser, Former Prime Minister 1975-1983From History Dictates that we say sorry - The Age 04-05-2000

Julie McCrossin (Australian Radio & TV presenter/journalist)
"Historical perspective is essential for anyone interested in social change. You need a
sense of yourself as part of a tradition of dissent and agitation in order to develop a
realistic set of expectations."

Older items:

2 October 2002 - Short biography of Marie Pitt (1869-1948), a poet, socialist, early feminist, ecologist and anarchist.
Against Terrorism, Against War is an index of articles that document the peace movement in Melbourne after the attack on the World Trade Centre in New York on September 11, 2001.

9 August 2002 - John Englart continues the story of Anarchism in Sydney in documenting the split in the Jura Books Collective during 1982, then details Anarchism in Sydney 1982-2002, the story of the two anarchist bookshops, Jura Books and Blackrose. This year Jura Books has been going for 25 years and Black Rose for 20 years. In Rebel Worker and Accountability John Englart examines the 20 year history of Rebel Worker, initially the paper of the Australian IWW, then of the Anarcho-Syndicalist Federation, and presently of the Anarcho-Syndicalist Network.

New in the biography section: Richard Curlewis, a life long advocate for workers' control.

1 August 2002 - Historical Overview of Anarchism in Melbourne pulls together many of the stories and people involved in the anarchist movement in Melbourne over the last 110 years. The Melbourne Anarchist Archives: Drafts and Documents 1966-1973 provides substantial information on the theoretical development of anarchism in Melbourne for the Melbourne/La Trobe current, as well as current issues and debates at the time including: Conscription, Maoism, Anti-war, support for the NLF, student protest, May Day, Workers' Control, the Moratorium movement, Czechoslovakia, Student action for Education. The other major anarchist current in Melbourne 1970 to 1975 was what was loosely termed 'carnival anarchism', which includes the stories of the Collingwood Freestore and Australia's first free Legal Aid Service.

20 June 2002 - Julian Ripley & the 1971 Labour & National Service Bombing in Perth tells how easy it is to get verballed and railroaded to prison for something you didn't do. Did the present WA Minister for Health, Bob Kucera, frame Julian 30 years ago?

Two people added to the biography section include Antonio Jimenez (1935-1990), a Spanish emigrant to Australia who became an Anarchist; and John Flaus - radio, stage and screen actor, film critic, academic, journalist and....philosophical anarchist.

In Origins of the Hunter Labour Movement Dr Bob James presents local labour history of Newcastle and the Hunter River in an exciting and varied format, which "allows the movement to grow out of working people's lives, as it did in practice".

Sydney's Libertarian Push has had an extraordinary impact on Australian culture and society. A diverse range of people passed through the parties, pubs and meetings. Darcy Waters "was an icon of freedom and rebellion for Sydney's weekend warriors, people who couldn't or wouldn't embrace a life of permanent protest." Germaine Greer is perhaps the most famous Australian anarchist, although she is better known for her radical feminism and counterculturalism. Jack 'the Anarchist' Grancharoff has been a fixture around the anarchist scene in Sydney since the 1950s.

Art's Alternative Tradition is a virtual tour that deals with society's aspirations and discontents as perceived by artists such as Noel Counihan and admired counterparts inluding Goya, Charlet, Daumier and Kollwitz. Virtual tour put together by art historian, Robert Smith.

John Olday was a council communist, cartoonist and artist who contributed to the anarchist movement in Germany, England and Australia through a range of strategies and his talents as a graphic artist and cartoonist. John Olday in Europe portrays his early and later life. John Olday in Australia contains his memoirs of nearly 20 years in Australia.

Harry Hooton (1908-1961) was a poet and philosopher ahead of his time. He was part of the Libertarian Push in Sydney during the post WW II years, with connections to Angela "Annie" Westbrook of the IWW and many of the poets and writers active in Australian Literature of the time. The anarchist philosophy he developed was anarcho-technocracy and The Politics of Things, which are prescient pieces of writing on anarchism, technics and society, still relevant today.

Latter Day Witches is the first chapter of Dr Bob James 1986 book, Anarchism and State Violence in Sydney and Melbourne 1886-1896 on the formation of the Melbourne Anarchist Club on May Day 1886 and the impact of the Haymarket Tragedy on anarchism in Australia. Dr Joe Toscano descibes the origins of Mayday in Australia

European Socialism

European Socialism and the Russian Revolution...Anarchism/Syndicalism.....Bob JamesThis is the text of a lecture written and given by Bob James at the University of Newcastle, Australia, around 1995. It is important as it gives some detailed background into the origins of the socialist movement, and the development of statist and libertarian forms of socialism.

Historiography - Articles about the study of History

Writing on Anarchism - Chapter Two of Dr Bob James 1986 book, Anarchism and State Violence in Sydney and Melbourne 1886-1896, in which he takes to task existing histories of the Australian labor movement and Labor Historians for the neglect of important aspects of the historical record. As Bob asserts: "Australian political historians give the impression of being politically illiterate and historically blind."

The Tragedy of Labour History in Australia.....Bob JamesAnarres Books in Melbourne organised for Bob James to present this talk at the New International Co-Operative Bookshop. Bob presents some provocative facts to challenge the Labour History orthodoxy. Further research into hidden labour history is continuing...

Questioning assumptions - Anarchism and Historiography....Bob JamesBob James argues that in historical research the evidence should lead. That history is made by people, often contradictory and rarely consistent. The job of historian is the work of a detective: to ask the right questions and examine motivations as much as rely on what is said by people.

History - some personal motivations and comments

This Web Page is an attempt to explore some of my family history and the history of working-class people in Australia.
Although much of this material has an academic style, this webpage is intended for all people interested in exploring the people and events that shape a radical tradition in Australia. Much of it is historical recollections experienced and documents written by ordinary folk.

History, as a subject in school, is increasingly being neglected and relegated as unimportant. But if we do not know where we are from, and how we came to be in our present predicament, the mistakes of the past will come to haunt us again. Meanwhile, those with the power and wealth will continue to define our actions and even our thoughts. George Orwell's dystopian vision in 1984 is already amoung us....

The radical tradition in Australia is diverse and complex.
An essential part of this tradition, and my own family tradition, has been the formation, growth, and finally dissolution of the Communist Party of Australia (C.P.A.).
As an anarchist, I do not condone the organisational practices and vanguardist policies of the Communist Party of Australia or other Marxist groups. But I do recognise
the revolutionary ideals that inspired these organisations and their contribution to a radical social tradition and culture in Australia.

These articles do not pretend to be unbiased. They very much speak out for socialism, social justice, and workers' control. They speak out against the ever growing gap between the rich and the poor in Australian society. Please visit Takver's Soapbox site to read my comments and links on current events.